


Severus The Reporter

by salazar_kat



Series: Background fics to 'Snacks and Letters' [15]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Dark, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-04
Updated: 2011-07-04
Packaged: 2017-10-21 00:34:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 697
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/218961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/salazar_kat/pseuds/salazar_kat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Severus is caught by Aberforth and Albus spying on the prediction, the prophecy. He seems to get off light.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Severus The Reporter

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Snacks and Letters](https://archiveofourown.org/works/216898) by [salazar_kat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/salazar_kat/pseuds/salazar_kat), [Sionna_Raven](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sionna_Raven/pseuds/Sionna_Raven). 



Thinking that I helped the Dark Lord is repellent to me now, and the fact that Albus and Aberforth let me off so lightly gives me joy in apportioning them at least a small bit of blame. They should have realized they weren't dealing with some mouse, but a dangerous and powerful wizard, and one proud to be a Death Eater. Someone not to play mind games with.

Yet blame has no use any more.

I shouldn't have listened, but that was my purpose: to divine Dumbledore's movements and motives. I was even to attempt a position at the Headmaster's school. I was not prepared to hear a prophecy, or part of one, Their conversation had been mind-numbingly tedious, and I made a mental note that Albus Dumbledore would take leave of her soon so I could file my report. A useless waste of a half hour at a keyhole in the Hog's Head passageway, I thought.

But Sybill Trelawney's voice changed abruptly, and my pulse quickened. Perhaps a decent investment, hovering by the door after all? The door was wooden and I stared at the knots in it, the patterns nature had made in the wood almost memorized in the past ten, twenty, thirty minutes of tedium. But then suddenly it was just a door, and I was just an observant guest at the Hog's Head.

Trelawney's voice was guttural, harsh, and put me in mind of jagged cliffs in a setting sun. Unknown, likely a bad omen of some kind. Part of me was scornful. I scarcely paid notice to Divination. She almost gurgled her words, not dreamy or ethereal in the slightest.

 _"The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches...born to those who have thrice defied...”Guttural gasping. “ _Born as the seventh month dies__...” I concentrated on the keyhole, a dark tarnished silver, filthy as one would expect of Aberforth's establishment.

Seized suddenly from behind, I flailed in Aberforth's arms. I wrenched myself out of the the barman's grip. We're both thin, and he's older, so we were an even match – until Aberforth snarled, “ _Incarcerous_ ” and I was bound. The scuffling had been noticed. Trelawney's narrow face with its ridiculous spectacles peered at me as did both Dumbledores. Aberforth made to chuck me from the building, but his brother said, “No, wait. We can't let him go just yet.”

“What, you want me to give him lodgings in the goat shed?” Aberforth said with amusement.

Albus Dumbledore stared at me, pulled out his wand and aimed it at me, while I strruggled against my bonds, my wand tightly bound in its pocket. “ _Imperio,_ ” Albus said to my relief. I had no small talent in resisting the Imperius Curse, and I certainly played the dunderhead and did not let him sense this. I used silent Occlumency, not needing to resort to a wand.

I sensed the older Dumbledore in my mind, telling me what to forget. I sensed Aberforth attacking at the same time, trying to cast an enduring _Silencio_ , and I suppressed a snort at this pathetic magic.

I wish now and forever that I had been horrible at Occlumency, and the real memory didn't shine in such good repair in my mind after the Unforgivable. And Aberforth couldn't charm me into silence like one of his precious goats. I sneered in his general direction for trying.

“Can we get rid of him yet, Albus?” the filthy barman asked his brother, who nodded gravely.

“I hope this is the last time we meet, Severus,” the elder Dumbledore said with unmistakable scorn. I loathe him acting his first name terms part with such derision,

Still, I thought...

Bind me with invisible ties, and I will overcome them. Use an Unforgivable curse on me, it's what I would have done to you. Underestimate my mind? Folly for all concerned. Aberforth wrenched me down the hallway and down the stone staircase, and ejected me from the front door.

I was too tricky for Lily's good. I Apparated to the Dark Lord's side, my mind open and ringing with what I interpreted as meaning nothing and what the Dark Lord interpreted as meaning everything.


End file.
